In recent years, as landline and mobile communication technologies have developed, digital messages have taken various types, such as emails, Short Messaging Service (SMS) messages, Enhanced Messaging Service (EMS) messages, and Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) messages. Each message type has its own limitations. For example, a SMS message can typically only transmit 160 characters in each message. Further, the message cannot contain attachments or graphics. This type of message is the least expensive type of text message for the cellular telephone service to send through their network in terms of network resources and cost to the user. EMS messages are typically an extension of SMS messages. EMS messages allow small graphics, melodies, animations and long, formatted text (such as bold or italic) messages of approximately 1000 characters to be transmitted. The cost to transmit, in both resources and user cost, an EMS message is greater than that for a SMS message. An MMS message is similar to a standard e-mail in which it has no character limits and can transmit attachments. However, a MMS message is, out of the three listed above, the most expensive type of text message that can be sent over the wireless network, in terms of resources and cost to the user.
Currently, cellular network providers provide separate domains for each type of message. For example, Verizon Wireless has separate domains such that an email sent to the MDN@vtext.com address (“MDN” is the Mobile Directory Number of the mobile station being messaged) is converted into a SMS message. While an email sent to the MDN@vzwpix.com address is converted into a MMS message, which is delivered to the mobile station with the listed MDN. SMS messages and MMS messages are sent using different servers and protocols, which is the root of the separate domains.
However, it is inconvenient for the senders of email messages to remember different email domains in order to send different types of messages. When a sender uses the “wrong” email domain, errors can occur or messages can be truncated because the “wrong” message service is used. Examples are attempting to send a message with large attachments or that exceeds 160 characters as a SMS message. Also, the user can be charged a premium for a MMS message that could have been sent as a SMS message, based on character length. While the cellular network provider recovers a premium for the MMS message, the message is taking resources that it does not necessarily require, which may cause capacity issues with the provider's network.
Hence a need exists for simplifying the email domains to a single domain and add a method and device to determine the type of message that is sent and convert it accordingly.